Nehemiah 8:9 Commentary - Dr Peter Masters

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Nehemiah 8:9

Comments

Ezra begins to read on the first day of the seventh month, but the people continue to gather to hear the book of the law of God read day after day throughout the month (Nehemiah 8:18). That month, the seventh month, included the memorial of blowing of trumpets on the first day of the month (Leviticus 23:24), the day of atonement on the tenth day of the month (Leviticus 23:27), and the feast of tabernacles, or booths, which began on the fifteenth day of the month and ran for seven days (Leviticus 23:34). This is what is referred to in Nehemiah 8:18. ‘Mourn not, nor weep.’ This is to be the great watchword. Why were they weeping? Let us assume that most of the people wept out of sincerity. We will put the best complexion upon this that we can. When they heard the words of the law, they came under conviction and they were grief stricken, and they felt their guilt, and they wept. The whole nation had come under judgment and been taken into exile, and here they were, back in their own land by the mercy of God, and they had been very slow to return to the worship that identified them as the people of God. They mourned over their sins and wept that they had departed from the Lord. This was a time of revival and the hearts of the people were now sensitised again to their failings and this felt to them to be an appropriate response to express their grief. Of course, some people may have wept, just because others were weeping. Crowd hysteria is common. Some people may have wept for some other reason, but regardless, everybody was gripped by sorrow and weeping. But in this case they were mistaken. The feast of trumpets on the first day of the month called them to rejoicing., and Ezra, and Nehemiah, and the Levites on the platform, all were urging the people not to weep so much.

Application

We are to harness our emotions in ways that are appropriate. We are to respond to the Lord with our minds, our wills, and our emotions. This feast called for joy. It was not to be an artificial joy, but they were to turn their minds to the good things that God had done for them and their emotions would then flow out of their proper appreciation of who he is and what he had done for them. Though there was reason to mourn their sin, mourning was not to be the totality of their response. We must come with joy also, for he has delivered us from our sins, and we are to be full of appreciation for this. We cannot thank him as we should when we are overwhelmed with grief. The day of atonement required the people to afflict their souls (Leviticus 23:27-29) and that would come later in the month, but that was not to be the sum total of their response. Of course we are to regret our sin; that is the whole purpose of confessing it. But at the same time, the overriding emotion is great joy and happiness, that in the mercy of God our sins have been atoned for, and forgiven, and we are going to come thankfully to Christ and rejoice in him. So this isn’t a time for sentimentality; it is a time for thanksgiving and rejoicing.

There is a time for weeping and there is a time for rejoicing. Take, for example, the Lord's Supper. We are to remember the Lord; we are to remember his suffering and death, and the terrible, terrible price he paid to purge away our sin. At the same time we are to rejoice. We are not to dwell on the sorrow. ‘I am sorry for my sin. I am sorry for what I have inflicted upon the Lord. I remember that the sole ground of my salvation is his suffering and death for his people. But at the same time he is not dead. It did not destroy him. He rose from the dead; he is alive in the heavens, and he had a tremendous victory. The cross of Calvary was not only the most terrible suffering, but the most astonishing victory in the history of the universe. For his people he banished death. He gave us joy and peace now and eternally, and we rejoice, and we thank him, and we think of his resurrection, and we think of our salvation and the benefits. Those who pray at the Lord's Supper will certainly remember sin, and the death of the eternal Son of God. But then they remember the resurrection also.

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Nehemiah 8:9 Commentary and Bible Study